A Grape with a View

We spent Saturday afternoon and evening with Ron Mansfield, Steve Lightner and Steve’s wife Candice. The Lightner’s made us a wonderful dinner complete with peaches in the salad (from Goldbud Farms of course), grilled lamb, multi-color potatoes and a tasty nectarine tart for desert.

One of the interesting components of this spectacular vineyard is the Counoise. There are only 18 vines of this Tablas Clone A grafted on 3309C rootstock. The vines are at the top of the lower block of vines – you can see them sticking up towards the grass in the photo to the left.

We co-fermented the Counoise in a Grenache/Mourvedre blend to learn more about its impact on our Southern Rhone style blends. Despite its low percentage (8%), it adds a lot of spice to the wine and a unique spice at that. We like it- just not sure what it is.